


The Prince of Any Failing Empire

by Herbcitty



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AceDeanDay, Acephobia (mild), Also features appearances from:, Asexual Character, Asexual Dean, Gen, Henry Winchester - Freeform, John Winchester - Freeform, M/M, Swearing, enforced gender roles
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-02-12
Packaged: 2018-05-20 00:28:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 661
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5986183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Herbcitty/pseuds/Herbcitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Dean is a teenager [14, 15, 16], he believes there is something wrong with him. He doesn’t line up to what the other boys are [girls, girls, girls; beer, sex, sport, live life and fuck the rest; MAN], he doesn’t line up to what his father is [shrewd, strength, soldier; alcohol, women, hunting, top of the game; MAN], he doesn’t line up to what television guys are [MAN].</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Prince of Any Failing Empire

**Author's Note:**

> This was my contribution to [asexual-supernatural's](http://asexual-supernatural.tumblr.com) Ace Dean Day, which took place on January 24 (I was a bit late, got my dates mixed up, oops). It's unbeta'd.
> 
> ((Title is from G.I.N.A.S.F.S by Fall Out Boy, credit to Pete Wentz and whoever else for that))
> 
> I didn't know what to tag this as, it's mostly Gen, vague enough that if you wanted to read it as ace!Destiel you totally could? Anyway, hope you enjoy!

i.  


When Dean is a teenager [14, 15, 16], he believes there is something wrong with him. He doesn’t line up to what the other boys are [girls, girls, girls; beer, sex, sport, live life and fuck the rest; MAN], he doesn’t line up to what his father is [shrewd, strength, soldier; alcohol, women, hunting, top of the game; MAN], he doesn’t line up to what television guys are [MAN].

But the thing Dean’s been doing so well damn near his whole life that it’s easy – too fucking easy – is pretending. He will be all of those things and more. All of them. What he feels and doesn’t are irrelevant, they always are. He is the Top of His Game. Always.

Pretence is never very comfortable to start with, when it’s been a while, when it’s been way too long. But Dean doesn’t know how to stop, so he doesn’t. It’s not who he wants to be, something in him protests and whines and Dean can never help but to pay a little attention to it. Not enough to do anything about it, just enough to know it’s there.

And Dean is MAN, his inability to feel anything for women (or men, he had thought, _maybe_ , for a while, but – no), be damned.

Nobody else needs to know.

ii.

When Dean is in his thirties [33, 34, 35] he starts to wonder again because. There is an angel, an angel who is supposed to be the most pure thing in the universe, sent from God, and this angel has pulled him out of hell, has put him back together and Dean is still the same. But he is pure again and Dean has decided he doesn’t need to be anything other. This angel [purity, divine, inhuman] has seen his soul and determined him good. Determined him worth saving.

This angel is not pure, is not divine, is too human. This angel’s name is Castiel and the moment he spoke Dean Winchester’s name for the first time he no longer belonged to heaven. And Dean doesn’t care, for this angel who is too human is not human enough to know all the ways Dean has never been human enough either.

When Dean is in his thirties, he meets a man named Henry Winchester, who fell out of his closet in a motel room one day. Henry Winchester is his grandfather, a man of letters, and hunted by a knight of hell (but never mind that). They have one conversation without Sam, one conversation as grandfather to grandson, one conversation which duct tapes up this gap that’s been in Dean’s chest for twenty years. Henry knows little but he does know this – he is a father and will do anything for his sons.

One conversation, one stilted text-book-like phrase that’s more difficult for Dean to wrap his head around than most of the lore books he’s ever read but yet is so _simple_ , one word. And Dean is understood. And Dean is whole. And Dean is human, impure angels and imperial demons be damned.

Nobody else needs to know.

iii.

When Dean is old [52, 64, 71] it doesn’t matter anymore. He wasn’t supposed to live this long (and he hasn’t; he’s been to hell and to heaven and to purgatory, and to the end and to the beginning and back again and again), and he has. It doesn’t matter that he’s never felt the pull (or whatever it is, Dean certainly doesn’t know) to sex that everybody else seems to have – his angel, his best friend, his Cas, who is still at his side, even after saving the world all those times, doesn’t either.

He is old and who he is and all he has done is a comfort of a life lived, many lives ended – but also many beginnings, everywhere. And Dean is asexual, other people’s nosiness at his happiness, his life, his relationship be damned.

Nobody else needs to know.

**Author's Note:**

> Also found here: [The Prince of Any Failing Empire](http://herbcitty.tumblr.com/post/138077567840/the-prince-of-any-failing-empire) on tumblr (please reblog if you enjoy!)


End file.
